Jay was six years old and had been taking guitar lessons for a couple of months. At the beginning of his lesson one day he said, "Guess what song this is." When he finished I complimented him and guessed that it was a great rendition of "Skip to My Lou". His shoulders slumped and he muttered, "Right". I must admit that his disappointment confused me. Then he perked up and challenged me to guess another one. After he played and I successfully guessed the song he was really disappointed.....and I was really confused.
His mother, who sat in the lessons, then informed me, "Jay really likes it when he fools you." Then with a subtle wink she said, "It sometimes takes me 30 or 40 minutes to finally guess the right one." Jay was all smiles and giggles when she told me that. I nearly choked to death trying to suppress my laugh. But now that I was brought up to speed on the proper rules of the game we tried again and sure enough he fooled me on the next several songs (wink, wink). We got away with this for two or three more weeks. (And the "Tom Sawyer 'Whitewashing the Fence' Award" goes to....)
Like Jay, I hate to practice but I love to play. If I mention to my wife that I need to work on some music you can bet it will involve too many games of Solitaire on the computer. "I really should practice", I say and then grab my phone to check FaceBook. But if I decide to "play" guitar I'm all over it. Practice is something I gotta do. Playing is something that I wanna do.
When I "practice" I work on the hard parts and repeat them over and over until they sound good. But when I "play" I spend a lot of time playing the hard parts over and over until they sound good. Ummm... What??
Practicing has such a dreary connotation to me. I'm not sure why. I guess it sounds like an obligation and playing sounds like the privilege that it is. Playing guitar is a way for me to postpone or avoid household chores. But I'd rather do the chores than practice.
I admit that this is a pretty dumb way for a man of my age to behave. (I was going to say a "mature" man, but most of you wouldn't let me get away with that one.) I have to trick myself into doing what I love to do just like a six year old.
Lately I've been using this as a teaching tool. I tell my young students to not worry about "practicing" and just "play" for 15-20 minutes every day. If there is time at the end of the lesson I ask the students to play for me. After all, no one takes lessons so they can practice. They take lessons so they can play. And playing is much more fun.